To Be A Maestro (The Maestro Chronicles) (25 page)

He was right of course, Reen had to admit, the command staff of the regulars are professionals and unlikely to make such foolish mistakes. “My gut tells me there is something going on in these woods. Everyone stay sharp.”

Guardsman Kainer, riding point, raised his hand, indicating he had spotted something up ahead. Reen heeled Vengeance in the sides and the horse shot forward, weaving through the trees, and then came to a stop beside Bleecher, who had raced along with him. Up ahead, just within view of where Kainer sat saddle, was the scene of a massacre. Reen raised his hand and with a few simple gestures, signaled his men to draw their we
apons and proceed with caution.

Bleecher arrived first and dismounted in front of a dead officer, whose horse had collapsed under him. “A hole has been punched clean through his back and the neck of his horse as well. I see no sign of the weapon used.”

Reen surveyed the scene, men and horses dead, wagons punctured where they were not splintered into useless pieces. He dismounted, walked among the carnage, and came upon a man who looked familiar. “This is Lieutenant Klomin,” he announced while bending down to take a closer look at the body.

“He was killed by a different weapon,” Sergea
nt Bleecher stated the obvious.

Given the fact that Klomin’s left temple was caved in, his neck snapped, and the way he lay crumpled on the ground forever staring up at the trees above, Reen could only agree. “This man was hit in the head by a heavy blunt object,” he replied, “The blow not only busted his skull at the temple it also snapped his neck.”

Kainer walked up and saluted. “Lieutenant, I found some sacks of food, all of which were torn open with the contents spilled on the ground, yet this train should have had more sacks than we found. I think whoever killed these men have taken the undamaged sacks along with the wagons, of which only the damaged ones remain.”

“I see no catapult,” Bleecher seemed fond of stating the obvious.

Reen followed the dead man’s stare up into the treetops. “These men were ambushed from up there,” he concluded. “Mount up, we are moving north.”

He had his men spread out to his right and left, to make them harder targets, as they weaved their way through the heavily wooded area. They no sooner were beyond sight of the first massacre than a second came into view. Fewer horses were dead on the ground, which meant the rest had fled or been stolen. This scene differed from the fi
rst in several disturbing ways.

“This man died of bee stings or something similar,” Guardsman Trollen called out from thirty strides away, standing over the swollen remains, and staring grimly.

Bleecher came from behind a tree farther to the right. “The one back there seems to have been killed by a lion,” he said while gesturing with his thumb.

Reen studied the area around him, taking in the images, analyzing them, trying to fit them into a larger picture. Crossbow bolts littered the skirmish site, lying on the ground, embedded in trees, and what remained of the wagons. He could find no sign of enemy dead, yet it was clear as a spring morning the cubs did not go down without a fight. Swords had been drawn and were lying uselessly in the dirt. There were holes in the ground, holes in the men, holes in their shields, all the exact same diameter, meaning the same type of weapon had been used. Even so, he saw no lances, spears, or javelins, which should have been here given the types of wounds inflicted. Men were crumpled up on the ground as if something massive picked them up and slammed them down with bone shattering force, while others, like the man found by Bleecher, were cle
arly taken like prey.

An osprey circled in the sky well above the trees and then flew north. Trollen walked around examining bodies while the rest of the squads stood ready as if expecting an attack at any moment, which is as it should be. “I see wagon tracks,”
Kainer announced.

Reen went to the area indicated, squatted down where the guardsman stood pointing, and said, “Whoever killed these men headed west with our supplies. I think it is time we go retrieve what is ours and inflict serious pain on the thieves. Mount up!”

Kainer took point position and Growmin took flank. Pon and Mora took positions to the right and left as the company followed the tracks through the forest, up and down hills, while raptors screeched from their perches in the treetops. Reen ignored the annoyance, preferring to concentrate on finding his prey, which is the way he now chose to think about the ambushers. His force continued weaving through the trees, careful to watch for an attack from any direction, including up, until the point man topped the latest hill and then quickly withdrew. He raced back down. “Horses and wagons are in the clearing just on the other side of this hill,” Kainer reported.

Reen trotted Vengeance to the foot of the hill, dismounted, and then crawled up to the crest and lay flat. Bleecher crawled up on his right. “Those are our food and supply wagons alright. And look, they have twenty catapults and even the portable smithy,” he spoke in a soft voice.

“A little low on man power,” Kainer observed.

Both men were stating the obvious. Reen counted four lightly armed soldiers in blue uniforms on horseback, in a broad clearing, riding slowly around a huge circle of wagons, which were also being used to corral hundreds of horses. Each rider had a miniature crossbow, sword, and dagger, yet no shields, armor, or chain mail. On the ground, under a tree to the right, sat a shirtless man wearing gray pants with a black stripe, could this be a survivor? A gray bandage circled his head, covering his eyes and ears, and his fingers and thumbs were similarly wrapped.

“Sergeant Bleecher, take your squad and come at them from the north. Sergeant Machen, take your squad and hit them from the south. Sergeant Sequan, come out of the west with yours. Sergeant Lellen, be ready to charge at them from the east. The rest with me and all of you be ready to charge when I do,” Reen ordered and watched as each squad moved in quick compliance to his commands.

The four men in blue continued their easy ride around the wagons, totally unaware of the danger about to befall them. Reen smiled while waiting for Bleecher and the others to signal their readiness, knowing the executions would then begin. This encounter would be a slaughter, not a battle, and the real fight would come when the ambushers with the deadlier weapons come back with whatever additiona
l spoils they managed to take.

The screeching of the raptors in the treetops grew so loud; it took awhile for Reen to notice a constant buzz had joined the chorus. He drew his battle ax and tuned out the noise when Bleecher and then the other Sergeants signaled their readiness using small reflectors to catch the sun’s rays. Reen swung the ax thrice and charged out into the open with twenty horsemen right behind him and the remaining squads bursting out of concealment from all compass points at once. The four soldiers in blue quickly formed a line, daggers drawn, and faced the charge of Sergeant Sequan and his squad
. He laughed at their audacity.

Hornets swarmed out of bushes, lions roared, and the full bellow of a sasquatch sounded throughout the clearing. The swishing sound of an unseen javelin whizzed by his ear and Reen glanced in the direction it seemed to come from. To his left a horseman in blue with sergeant stripes on his tattered sleeves led a team of four straight at him. Another team of five raced to engage Sergeant Machen and a fourth clearly intended to take on Bleecher and his squad. Lellen and his men they ignored completely. If not for the raging creatures making a ruckus, the situation would be laughable. Four teams of lightly armed men seemed eager to battle heavily arme
d squads five times their size.

Kainer, on the horse to the right, screamed and fell to the ground squirming with a hole in his left shoulder that seemed to have come from above. Reen stared up into the tree and spotted a woman in blue sitting on a branch and holding a dagger. She pointed the dagger at Kainer and suddenly a hole appeared in the scout’s chest and ended his suffering. These people had some new kind of weapon and Reen had seen enough evidence at the massacre sites to know his shield would be no protection. He raised his ax and signaled a retreat, deciding it was better to fall back, regroup, and wait until he gained a better understanding of this new we
apon.

A sasquatch yanked Lellen right out of the saddle and slammed him onto the ground. The Sergeant gained his footing and went limping on the attack, swinging his ax at the huge hairy beast. Hornets stung his hands, his face, his neck, and yet he managed to plant the head of his ax in the neck of the gray-black monster. He had one solid kill to his credit and then a black panther lunged at him from behind and he died with his neck in its jaws. His entire squad was quickly overwhelmed and killed by hornets, panthers, and scores of sasquatches. The reason his squad had been ignored by the men in blue had become painfully clear.

All around him men were dying, unable to comply with his order to withdraw. Reen realized he had been correct, this is a slaughter, but not in the way he expected.

The Sergeant in blue, dagger in one hand and sword in the other, faced him on horseback. “You are better armed than the other soldiers we faced,” the young man said.

One hundred men were now dead on the ground and Reen knew he would soon join them. The hornets were withdrawing, the panthers walked beside the Sergeant’s horse as if they considered him part of the same pride, although the stallion eyed the huge cats as if he did not share the same familiarity, and did not trust them. The sasquatches were climbing back into the trees. Eighteen mounted men, their blue uniforms torn, smudged, and splattered with blood, formed up, encircling Reen, well seventeen men and one woman. After all he had observed since coming to see what happened to the supply trains, the presence of female soldiers seemed the least of the surprises.

“I don’t see that it mattered given your allies and those death daggers,” he replied while maintaining a tight grip on his ax. “I do not recognize the falcon clutching a lightning bolt insignia. May I know who has bested me before we end this?” He remembered seeing the same emblem on the north gate before being sent on the mission.

The woman smiled. “We are the Chosen’s Sentinels.”

A bald man, who seemed to have lost his helmet, flicked the reigns and his horse moved to stand beside the mounted Sergeant. “We serve the Champion, the greatest Maestro of them all.”

Sasquatches and yetis serve Tarin Conn, Reen knew for a fact. Why would soldiers working for the Serpent Guild fight against their allies? Maybe Runyan Lymin was right all along about the Aakacarns. “We are supposed to be on the same side, why are you fighting us?”

The Sergeant laughed at him. “Hardly the same side, we serve Daniel Benhannon, and you are now my captive,” he said and then lost the humor when an osprey landed on his shoulder and let out a screech. It appeared to be the same one that had flown to the north. “Would you rather that we kill him?” The squad leader inquired of his feathered friend.

Reen could not help but gawk when the raptor actually shook its head, giving a clear negative response in answer to the question. Even though he expected to die, it never occurred to him his fate would be decided by a bird. “Who is in command here?”

“Sergeant Tanner commands the squad, but the ultimate commander is Sir Daniel himself,” said a young man to the right of the female Sentinel.

A grunt sounded from above and a huge beast swung out of a nearby tree, landing a few paces from the Sergeant. It was the tallest and slimmest sasquatch Reen had ever seen and the pungent scent wafting from its black fur equaled that of several skunks. At ten cubits in height, it towered over everyone. “Alfa Daniel say move that way,” the male said in a somewhat garbled, yet understandable voice while pointing west. Reen realized his mouth was still open and then closed it. “No more scavengers come to hunting ground. Go to walls when others go back to own hunting ground.” The beast delivered the message and then took a great leap, caught a branch, and swung back up into the tree.

The bald Sentinel pointed his dagger at Reen’s chest. “The weapons, you can drop them now.”

Reen relaxed his grip, allowing the ax to fall and then slowly drew his sword and dropped it as well. The Ducaunans were better defended than General Kall had been led to believe. The butcher’s bill for this campaign is going to be far higher than expected and paid mostly by the wrong side. For the first time Reen began to wonder if there even is a wrong or right side.

-------

Mallory SuKendall took another bite out of her chicken leg while staring at the hillside to the north. Twilight was upon them and torches along the walls were being lit, some of which had angled mirrors behind them to focus the light toward the kill zone. General Tallen’s series of signal towers from fort to fort worked in a similar way only on a much larger scale. An orange glow on the other side of the hill marked the Pentrosan lines. They had started their fires a mark earlier in an effort to drive away the wasps and the smoke seemed to have done its job, not that she could see much of the results from her vantage point. It was the lack of hearing men scream and complain that gave her the clue.

After the first attack of Sir Daniel’s tiny air-born soldiers that sent hundreds of enemy horsemen flying from their steeds and tumbling down the hill, the much lauded Sutton Guard retreated out of bow shot, and all seemed quiet. Mallory sipped from her canteen and wondered what would happen
next.